Changing attitudes: a research on attitudes of religious groups towards former prisoners reentry

Abstract

As a consequence of the boom in incarceration that began on the 70s, more people than ever are being released from prison. This, added to high recidivism rates, has meant that since the beginning of the XX century interest in the reentry of former prisoners in the USA as well as in UK has widely increased within political circles, in academic circles and in the general public. Research on both desistance and recidivism has demonstrated the importance of social reaction as a the way out of crime. Nevertheless, little is known about attitudes towards former prisoners and even less about how to change those attitudes. By combining quantitative and qualitative data, this research tries to understand if watching a highly emotive documentary and participation in a focus group changes attitudes, and if so, why and how those attitudes have changed. In order to do so, two sessions were conducted in two different churches in two different neighbourhoods. The results suggest that the session as a whole was effective in changing those attitudes and that the predictor that is most related to that change was an increase in empathy towards former prisoners as a consequence of the documentary.